


College, Man

by BurnMeAtTheStake



Category: Love Live! Sunshine!!
Genre: Coffee Shops, Cute, F/F, Fluff, It's good I swear, Slow Burn, Useful lesbian but not really, attempts at comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-07
Updated: 2020-03-07
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:35:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23045641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BurnMeAtTheStake/pseuds/BurnMeAtTheStake
Summary: “You know what,” Riko says, smiling down on Chika like a saint. “I’m not giving you another Midnight drink, but if you want, I could give you one more cupcake. On the house this time,” She turns around, but not before winking. “You’re funny. And weird. I’d hate for you to drop everything in your life right now to pursue a job in Narnia.”
Relationships: Sakurauchi Riko/Takami Chika
Comments: 1
Kudos: 24





	College, Man

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, another fic. Good luck reading it, y'all.

It’s four a.m. Chika checked her phone at least five times to confirm that, yes, it was indeed four a.m. She is up at four in the morning. Either her eyes need glasses or its four in the fucking morning. It’s the ass crack of dawn on a Wednesday, and she’s stuck finishing a goddamn paper for her music theory class. 

_ Jesus, save my soul.  _

She’s trying her hardest here, really. Chika even left the comfort of her own room and settled in the kitchen dining table, just so that she wouldn’t doze off writing mid-sentence, seduced by the allure of a comfortable bed and soft blankets. But that was around yesterday ago, when she genuinely had the motivation to do anything besides complain. The only thing to comfort her now is the fifth cup of red bull and Vodka she’s huffing like cocaine, and the “ _ Do your best!”  _ text that You had sent her, in a null but nonetheless sweet attempt to get her to actually do her shit. 

“At this rate, you’ll never get it done,” an irritating voice beside her chides. It’s her very best friend and one and only anchor in this world, Kanan Matsuura, diligently neglecting her own marine biology report. Chika glances across the table, blissfully ignoring the mass of textbooks and piles of documents. One look makes it evident that Kanan has absolutely fuck all to show for the past six hours, too. 

Chika doesn’t want to hear anything coming from someone on the same boat. “Dude, you’ve got, like, fifteen words done for a fifteen hundred word essay.” 

“Hey, I never said I was functioning, either,” Kanan huffs, side-eyeing Chika’s work. “But, since we’re on the topic, I would like to point out that I’ve written about twelve more words than you.” She sticks her tongue out childishly, and if Chika was a better woman, she would gracefully ignore that snide remark and continue doing whatever she needed to do. 

“Wow, the bare minimum. I am truly impressed by your power, Kanan,” 

She’s not a better woman. In fact, she’s a petty and grumpy woman that has only had twenty consecutive seconds of sleep and exactly five thousand bones to pick with whatever God there is out there that decided that she should have music as her major. Chika could’ve been so many things ― and she fucking chose music as a career? Who’s sick idea was this? 

“ Cool it, Chika. I think I can see the steam come out of your ears. If you’re not careful, the stick up your ass might catch on fire,” 

She’s too tired to argue with that, so she settles on muttering some choice words under her breath and goes back to writing. Kanan’s ready for an argument, anything that gets her out of doing her work, but the silence afterwards gives her nothing to latch on to. Chika’s not in the mood to fight, and she’s damn sure the campus police would strangle them the next time their neighbours called for noise complaints. 

There’s a short pause, just a few minutes that mellow the tension. Kanan eventually goes back to her phone, probably texting Mari about what ideal dildo would be right for them, while Chika scans through her notes from the days’ lectures. They don’t need words to convey the fact that both of them would rather be doing literally anything else right now. It’s a truce of sorts. 

It’s the initial peace of the day. 

_ BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! _

The peace and subsequently, everything else, ends when the coffee maker suddenly blares loudly from its place near the kitchen sink, breaking both girls from their concentration. 

In their fatigue, they forgot that Dia, the blessed third roommate that she is, made a pot of coffee with their last few Starbucks mixes she found in the pantry, before departing to hang out with her sister.

Kanan is instantly very grateful for the years she’s known Dia. In all their lives, Dia has always been an amazing girl, someone to trust in a crisis . There has never been a moment where she took their friendship for granted, and it’s in hard situations like these that she realizes how much Dia loves her. Truly, she’s the Jesus to her Mary, the Cody to her Zack, the Hermione Granger to her Harry Potter. 

She was so busy being thankful for her childhood friend that she didn’t notice Chika throwing down the notes she had been reading, and lunging out of her seat to the coffee, until the sound of a wooden chair clashed with their floor. 

It was almost too late when Kanan caught up to her.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, you orange bitch?” Kanan screeches loudly, grabbing hold of the hood on Chika’s jacket and flinging her with half her might. This minor setback doesn’t deter the other girl though, as Chika quickly gets up to retaliate.

“I’m running on spite and desperation, you dolphin loving whore!” Chika yells back, getting up to reach for her goal. “I need it more than you!” 

“Like hell you do! I’m the dumbass that willingly took a morning class this semester!”

Chika’s close to it. She can sense the heat coming from the container, can feel the liquid as it pours down her throat. It isn’t hard to just stretch a little more. 

“And who’s fault was that?!”

Kanan can feel her grip loosen on the jacket. She’s running on mediocre sushi and two bottles of five-hour energy, so there’s no way she’s able to summon all her strength. Besides that, Chika’s an absolute beast when it comes to getting things she wants, and boy, does she want all the fucking coffee. Right now, Chika’s a bull that just saw a shit load of red. 

“Let go of me!”

“When hell freezes over!” 

Kanan’s unwilling to concede, but before she can think of a way to stop her foe, she unexpectedly loses the grip she once had on the jacket, and it’s all downhill from there. Kanan sees what’s about to happen in painstakingly slow motion. Chika begins to fall face-first onto the counter, and that’s when she starts flailing her arms. The descent must’ve taken a nanosecond in real-time, but the movement haunts the both of them like a ghost. Chika’s hands reach for anything nearby, like a ledge of some sort, and she lands on the spot near the coffee machine, forearm first. But in the process of avoiding the fall, Chika’s arm reflexes involuntarily fling the closest thing away, and the sound of glass shattering is almost enough to put both of them into tears. 

“ **FUCK** ,”

In hindsight, maybe sharing would’ve solved this situation. 

  
  
  
  


“Be roommates with us, she said,” Chika grumbles underneath her breath, pulling her brown fleece closer to her body, “It’ll be  _ nice _ , she said.” 

It’s cold outside and the world hates her guts. Right after the pot of coffee crashed inside the sink, Kanan had asked (demanded, more like) her to buy something for the both of them at a local cafe just right around the corner. And ever the one to obey, Chika grabbed some spare change, a nice looking coat, and headed off her merry way.

The money in her pocket screams ‘ _ I’m cheap’ _ , but the tiredness in her eyes makes it clear that the last thing she needs right now is constructive criticism. There’s a few poor souls that pass by her; a guy downing an incredibly debilitating looking bottle of beer, slugging his way through the streets, some couple that was fighting way too loudly to be comfortable right outside an apartment complex, and a jogger that must’ve had her shit together to an envious degree since no one jogs at 5 a.m unless they’ve got their shit together. 

Chika strolls around for a little bit until she finally stops at a quaint looking shop, with the brightest lights to her aching eyes, and a home-like aura around it. There’s a promise of chocolate croissants and strawberry cupcakes on the display case, and suddenly, Chika’s very aware of the black hole sized crater in her stomach.

The story almost writes itself. 

The jingle chimes make her sleep-deprived brain chuckle a little, but the voice that’s suddenly there is surprising (‘ _ It’s a store’ she can hear Dia say. ‘Why would it not have people?’) _ .

“Welcome in,” the cashier inside greets her. Chika looks up to see a familiar face―it's the girl from her freshman comp class, the one with red hair and a fetish for yuri manga. 

She doesn’t exactly talk much, and especially not to Chika. But it’s rude not to remember the name of the girl that literally sits right next to you every afternoon, and it's even ruder not to answer someone when they’ve welcomed you inside. 

“Hey Riko,” Chika greets back. “Fancy seeing you here,” 

There’s a surprised look on her face, like Riko didn’t expect her to know her name. Chika’s a little bit proud of herself; she’ll pat her back later, though. Right now, her mind’s going numb and the only thing she’s capable of focusing on is the price of all their pastries. “Could I, by any chance, buy your entire stock of chocolate croissants?”

The surprised look turns into one of utter shock. She’s frowning at Chika like she’s growing an extra head. “You know they cost, like, an arm and a leg, right?” 

Yes, they’re three dollars and fifteen cents each. Plus tax. It’d be bad if she spent her entire paycheck on something like this, especially since rent is coming up soon. But Chika’s desperate, and by desperate, she means she has Kanan’s Credit Card number and PIN memorised. There’s a high risk that she’ll die if Kanan finds out she used it, but it's a chance she has to be willing to take.

“You don’t look like you know,” Riko’s voice abruptly punctures her decision-making process. She leans over the counter to point to another pastry on display. “I’d say just go for the cupcakes. They might not taste as good, but they’re a lot cheaper and a lot bigger.“

Well, that's an idea. It starts to get nicer the more she thinks about it. The cupcakes maybe weren’t as good as the croissants, but quantity is better than quality. 

“I also need coffee. You got any suggestions for that?” 

Riko stops to think. “You can get a vanilla latte with six expresso shots,” she folds her arms in knowingly, like an anime detective after cracking a case. There’s a gleam in her eyes that wasn’t there before. “Or the Midnight cold brew, specially designed for fatigued spirits like yours.”

Fatigue spirit is the understatement of the year. 

“Alright, then I’ll go with one of your red velvet cupcakes and two Midnight cold brews,” Chika decides. Riko nods and rings her order up in the cash register. 

“Eight dollars and Sixty-four cents, please,” 

Chika reaches in the deep depths of her coat pocket for the loose change inside, and Riko’s right at work the minute she cashes the money in. She’s spinning around behind the counter like she’s Belle from Beauty and the Beast, except instead of a well-dressed beast-turned prince, she has Chika, and instead of a beautiful ball gown, she has an apron and a tacky black visor. She pulls out a pre-made red velvet cupcake to dump in the heater in the back, and dances around the room towards the grinding machines and blenders. 

“So are you planning to drink all of this in one morning?” Riko asks, once more breaking the silence. She’s finishing the last touches to the Midnight Pick-Me-Up, and Chika almost couldn’t hear her over the sound of her mind screaming sweet victory. “I get that you’re desperate for energy and a grade, but two Pick-Me-Ups have, like, eight expresso shots combined, and at that point, I think doing cocaine is easier.” 

“Nah, one’s for my roommate, Kanan,” Chika answers. “We’ve been up since ass crack o'dawn finishing some essays, and we just broke the only thing keeping the both of us sane.”

Riko studies Chika for a minute. “You’re finishing our essay on Modern World Leaders? Wasn’t that due two days ago?” 

Wait, what.

“We had an essay due in that class?!” 

Oh, wonderful. Absolutely spectacular. The world was in love with hating her guts. Now she had to write two essays in three hours. But how in the hell was she gonna write two essays in the span of about three hours? What a terrible, horrible, no good day. 

“You look like you’re having the time of your life,” Riko comments sarcastically, handing Chika her order. She graciously accepts it, and the first sip of the Midnight-Whatever-Its-Called is heaven to her brain. 

Chika chugs the damn thing almost instantaneously. The weight of her future is on her shoulders and she’s not doing fine and honestly, “ ― I’m genuinely close to finding the nearest closet and fucking off into Narnia. There’s too much in this world for a lonely, normal girl like me, and I’m sick of it. I just frat guy-ed a cup of coffee like it was nothing, and now I can smell colour.”

Oh, she said that out loud. There’s a little giggle coming from the other girl. It’s nice, airy, not full of worry, and Chika feels a sense of envy that someone could sound like that this early in the morning. 

“You know what,” Riko says, smiling down on Chika like a saint. “I’m not giving you another Midnight drink, but if you want, I could give you one more cupcake. On the house this time,” She turns around, but not before winking. “You’re funny. And weird. I’d hate for you to drop everything in your life right now to pursue a job in Narnia.”

Holy shit, Chika thinks she fell in love. Riko from her freshman comp class is an angel sent from above who gives strangers that give off the aura of death a free cupcake if they seem pathetic enough. What a kindred soul. 

“I love you,” 

Riko laughs again and hands Chika her cupcake. “How about we become friends first?” 


End file.
